Paizojamming: Skull and Shackles and Distant Worlds
It is a testament to the quality of Paizo’s products that I am about to do something I have not done since the original Ravenloft module was released in the ’80s. I am going to run an adventure *gasp* exactly as written.
Not only that, but I am committed to running the entire adventure path – levels one to fifteen – as presented. Skull and Shackles is just that good. So far the first installment, The Wormwood Mutiny, is wonderful. From the opening scene where the PCs wake in the hold of a pirate ship after having been press ganged – to the new mechanics for Infamy and Disrepute it is a joy. Major bonus points for both fluff and crunch, something I am coming to expect of Paizo as they continually raise the bar for RPG quality.
Wormwood takes characters from first through third level, giving them a taste of ship board life among a crew of scalawags. Quick and realistic rules for crew interactions, ship board punishments, a fully detailed pirate goddess and other elements combine to give the best take on ship bound adventuring I’ve seen. From these humble beginnings our pirates fight for survival as they work towards mutiny and a ship of their own.
So with ships and pirates and seafaring rules in the mix I’m sure people are wondering how rapidly I’ll be adapting the material to Spelljammer. The answer is 16th Level. You see, the Skull and Shackles adventure path runs from first to fifteenth level taking the PCs from prisoners to Pirate Lords. Conveniently enough there is a sixteenth level adventure in the works, The Moonscar, that will take the party from Golarion to its satellite. It should make a great jumping off point. From there, after they acquire a spelljamming helm, the rest of the solar system awaits.
And what a solar system it is, beautifully detailed in Distant Worlds the gazetteer for Golarion’s star system. Spelljammer DMs take heed – this volume belong on your shelf next to Greyspace and Realmspace. It’s a terrific gazetteer of the strange and terrible things that exist beyond Paizo’s core world. Of course, like Golarion itself, there are science fiction elements here as well. Much like Expedition to the Barrier Peaks or the City of the Gods in Mystara, you will find elements like machine intelligences and neural nets interspersed with the more traditional fantasy fare. It;s easily ignored if that doesn’t fit the style of your game so don’t consider it a down point.
So, to recap the plan.
- Run the Skull and Shackles adventure path as is.
- Run The Moonscar (or liberally pillage it, can’t say till I’ve seen it).
- Use Distant Worlds to take them into space, and perhaps eventually as far as Greyspace…
I’ll be blogging about as I go, and as usual you can follow along with the character journals and such on the Obsidian Portal page for the campaign.
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Paizo Scores a Crit!
While I am still skeptical of how compatible with 3.5 Pathfinder will be I do know that I am certainly on Paizo’s side in the bold steps they have taken in response to the way WOTC has been handling Fourth Edition.
Today the former publishers of Dragon Magazine and Dungeon Magazine rolled a natural twenty! Here is the press release:
Monte Cook Joins the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game™ Team
Co-creator of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons® to act as Rules Consultant
Paizo Publishing®, LLC today announced that Monte Cook, the co-creator of 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons and author of the 3.5 PHB and DMG as well as the Ptolus™ campaign setting and the recent Book of Experimental Might™, has joined the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game team as a Rules Consultant.
“This is going to be a lot of fun,” said Monte Cook. “Pathfinder is a fresh spin on a rules system that I love and the guys at Paizo are great to work with. They produce nothing but the highest quality products.”
“Monte Cook is a legend of third edition and of the Open Gaming movement,” said Paizo’s Publisher, Erik Mona. “He’s also a great DM, and has the best mind for mechanics I’ve ever seen. To have one of the original third edition designers helping us with the Pathfinder RPG is like a dream come true. With Monte’s involvement, I am certain that the future of the edition he helped to create will be very long and very fruitful.”
Natural One
Fear the Fumble! Today Paizo added pre-sale on a product I have been waiting for: The Critical Fumble Deck! Players beware!
Paizo Takes Up The 3.5 Torch!
Like many people I’ve run across on various RPG boards I am apprehensive about 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons. It seems, from what I have heard of it, to resemble World of Warcraft more than DND. Now I am not a player of video games, I am a pure tabletop gamer to the core. Its all about interaction and collaborative storytelling to me, so this is not a positive comparison. Factor in the huge collection of hardcovers that have accumulated in these few short years and I see a major investment becoming invalidated by the new rules.
Enter Paizo Publishing, you know them- they’re the folks who used to publish Dragon Magazine and Dungeon Magazine. Seems like they are putting out a new RPG, Pathfinder, which will basically be DND 3.75 and completely compatible with existing material. Even better than that- the 65 Page Preview PDF! I for one am absolutely thrilled. Best part is that while they are applying some tweaks to the 3.5 rules the core book they are releasing is supposed to be 100% backwards compatible and will be on the shelves around the time (guessing) that the original Core Books are gone. Viva la Paizo!
Here, for your enjoyment, is their press release with a lot more details:
Paizo Publishing® Announces the Pathfinder RPG™
Pathfinder™ to continue under the 3.5 rules.
March 18, 2008 (BELLEVUE, Wash.) – Paizo Publishing today unveiled the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, a tabletop fantasy roleplaying game that will serve as the anchor for the company’s popular line of Pathfinder adventures, sourcebooks, and campaigns. Today marks the beginning of a year-long open playtest of the new rules, which are based upon the popular 3.5 rules available under the Open Game License. The Pathfinder RPG is designed with backward compatibility as one of its primary goals, so players will continue to enjoy their lifelong fantasy gaming hobby without invalidating their entire game library. The first Pathfinder RPG Alpha release is available now as a free 65-page PDF download at paizo.com/pathfinderRPG. Until the finished Pathfinder RPGs release as a hardcover rulebook in August 2009, all of Paizo’s popular Pathfinder-brand products will continue under the current 3.5 rules set.
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